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  The Last Asylum - A Memoir of...

  Barbara Taylor

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  Blending personal memoir with social history, the author shares an “exquisitely written and provocative” account of mental illness and care (Sunday Times, UK). 
   
  In the late 1970s, Barbara Taylor, then an acclaimed young historian, began to suffer from severe anxiety. Eventually, her struggles led her to be admitted to the infamous Friern Mental Hospital in North London—once known as the Colney Hatch Lunatic Asylum. The Last Asylum is a candid account of her time there, and probing look at the evolution of mental health treatment. 
   
  Taylor was admitted to Friern in 1988, not long before England’s asylum system began to undergo dramatic change. The 1990s saw the old asylums shuttered, their patients left to navigate a perpetually overcrowded and underfunded mental health system. But Taylor contends that the emptying of the asylums also marked a bigger loss—a loss of community.  
   
  Taylor credits her own recovery to the help of a steadfast psychoanalyst and a circle of friends, including Magda, her manic-depressive roommate, and Fiona, who shared stories of her boyfriend, the “Spaceman”. The support and trust of that network was crucial to Taylor’s recovery, offering a respite from the “stranded, homeless feelings” she and others found in the outside world.

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  Scott Walker - The Rhymes of...

  Lewis Williams

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  Scott Walker is without parallel as an artist, acclaimed as an influence by Bowie, Julian Cope, Marc Almond, Nick Cave and Jarvis Cocker. As lead vocalist of the Walker Brothers, his soulful baritone made him a major interpreter of heartbroken ballads. As a solo artist, the influence of balladeer Jacques Brel and existentialist literature took him to new depths of emotional expression on the albums Scott 1-4.
  Then came years of obscurity as a covers artist, before his career took off on a unique trajectory — witnessed by his extreme contributions to the Walkers' 1978 reunion album, Nite Flights, the opaque tone poems of 1984's Climate of Hunter, the bewildering brilliant 1995 Tilt, and the unrelenting psychic assault of 2006's The Drift.
  In this comprehensive illustrated volume, lifelong fan Lewis Williams charts this unique and enigmatic career song by song. From his 1960s heyday and beyond, every classic, every rarity and every obscurity ever recorded by Scott Walker is detailed with an obsessive enthusiasm that only he can inspire.

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  High Price - A Neuroscientist's...

  Carl Hart

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  High Price is the harrowing and inspiring memoir of neuroscientist Carl Hart, a man who grew up in one of Miami’s toughest neighborhoods and, determined to make a difference as an adult, tirelessly applies his scientific training to help save real lives. Young Carl didn't see the value of school, studying just enough to keep him on the basketball team. Today, he is a cutting-edge neuroscientist—Columbia University’s first tenured African American professor in the sciences—whose landmark, controversial research is redefining our understanding of addiction.In this provocative and eye-opening memoir, Dr. Carl Hart recalls his journey of self-discovery, how he escaped a life of crime and drugs and avoided becoming one of the crack addicts he now studies. Interweaving past and present, Hart goes beyond the hype as he examines the relationship between drugs and pleasure, choice, and motivation, both in the brain and in society. His findings shed new light on common ideas about race, poverty, and drugs, and explain why current policies are failing.

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  For Greater Things: The Story of...

  William T. Kane

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  Saint Stanislaus Kostka was a 16th century Polish novice in the Society of Jesus.  Polish nobleman John Kostka was not pleased with the spiritual inclinations of his second son. He did all he could to discourage Stanislaus’s desire for Christian service.  Paul, a brother two years older than Stanslaus, bullied him and tried to lure him into more worldly pursuits.  Stanislaus was determined to join the Society of Jesus. To demonstrate his determination, Stanislaus walked the long and dangerous 350 miles from Vienna to Rome. He made the trip alone depending on the charity of others and there was accepted into the Society of Jesus as a novice on his 17th birthday.  During his short time as a novice his religious fervor and piety were amazing. He was beatification in 1605; and he canonized on 31 December 1726.  - Summary by Wikipedia and Phil Chenevert

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  Hanged for Murder

  Tim Carey

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  Between 1923 and 1954 the Irish state executed twenty-nine people convicted of murder. Almost all executions were carried out in the hanghouse of Mountjoy Prison by members of the Pierrepoint family. The often shocking and fascinating stories of these men and one woman have been largely forgotten. Their remains lie behind prison walls as strange testaments to an abandoned form of punishment. Among those buried in Mountjoy are Bernard Kirwan, convicted of killing his brother, though a body was never conclusively identified. Kirwan's presence in Mountjoy Prison and his execution inspired Brendan Behan's play 'The Quare Fellow'. Also there lie Henry McCabe, convicted of killing six people in a house in Malahide, and Annie Walsh, convicted of murdering her husband for compensation money. Few had ever been convicted of a crime before each was convicted of the most serious of all. The voices of some seem to whisper from the unmarked graves that it was not they who carried out the crime as doubts remain about the safety of some of the convictions. 'Hanged for Murder' tells their stories, some in graphic detail, for the first time.

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  Death Gratuity : One Gold Star...

  James A Price

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  This is the story of how James lost his son to The Navy in 2015 and the events that followed. Henry Price was happy and filled with ambition and a love for life, like most young men his age. He enlisted in the military after high school in hopes of getting the free college GI Bill to follow his dreams. He joined the Navy with hopes and aspirations but had no idea what would happen when he got posted in Japan. This story follows the events that happened after his death and how different gold star families of our fallen servicemen are treated if they haven’t died in the line of duty. Henry was returned in the cargo hold of a United Airlines flight from Seoul to Chicago. No Military guard unloaded the plane, just the poor baggage handlers sweating in the tropical heat. His body was inside a wooden crate, no flag, nothing. This is a story of a gold star family and how they deal with the death of their beloved son.

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